March 31, 2016

Far Cry Primal Goes Hardcore

Ubisoft has announced that Far Cry Primal is going to get a lot harder when the game gets an update on April 12 that adds the all new Survivor Mode.

The game is not just going to be harder if you play it this way, you can also enable permadeath, meaning you only get once chance to beat the entire game, the cold will now always be a factor, even at night and the animals that you can tame will now no longer be easy to get, with some of the higher level animals needing to be beaten to at least half health before you can tame them.

But that is not all, the animals now will no longer be respawnable after they die, so if you loose your wolf in battle, you will have to go and find another wolf and tame them all over again. This however does not work for those beast master missions, once those animals die, they are gone for good.

“The idea of doing this mode actually started from the team, saying they wanted to create this mode based on feedback they got from the community,” says Thomas Simon, Far Cry Primal’s game director. “The keystone of that survival mode is the change in the exploration, crafting, and difficulty of the game to make it even more realistic. After that, there are options the player can activate to go further.”

Survivor mode also adds a stamina gauge, making protagonist Takkar slower and weaker when it runs out, and forcing him to sleep in order to replenish it. The minimap is now turned off by default, pushing you to pay more attention to your surroundings, and the fog of war has been strengthened, lessening the amount of the map you reveal as you explore. You’ll encounter humans and animals less often as you explore, which means hunting takes a little more patience. Even fast travel is a little tougher, as it now consumes stamina and food.

Takkar himself has also been weakened in a few key ways. He can no longer rain remote-control death on foes using his owl, for example, and crafting ammo now takes a few seconds, instead of being instantaneous. He’s also now a lot more susceptible to cold, which increases his dependency on fire, and makes crafting cold-weather gear a top priority if you’re planning to venture into the chillier parts of Oros. On the upside, the duration of Takkar’s Hunter Vision has been increased – which should come in handy for surviving the longer, darker, deadlier nights that now befall the land of Oros.

So is there a benefit to all this, aside from grueling satisfaction and the pride that comes from extreme challenge? Of course, says Simon.

“We’ve created four new Ubisoft Club challenges,” says Simon, adding that new PlayStation Trophies or Xbox Live Achievements aren’t possible in a free update. “If you go for the ultimate challenge – activating Survivor mode, playing on expert difficulty and activating permadeath – you have the hardest and most insane challenge possible for the game, and there’s a special reward at the moment you complete the game. I won’t spoil it.”

The PC version of the game will also be updated to allow for 4K textures to be added, for those with the screens capable of using them.